


In Another Time

by gentlezombie



Category: Le Comte de Monte-Cristo | Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
Genre: F/F, Future Fic, Misses Clause Challenge, Pastiche, four things
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-22
Updated: 2011-12-22
Packaged: 2017-10-27 21:07:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,657
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/300053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gentlezombie/pseuds/gentlezombie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Four alternative futures set after the events of 1838, written by a mysterious but well-informed author.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In Another Time

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Grey_Bard](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Grey_Bard/gifts).



_One: The Poet and the Ghost_

If the Parisian society, where opinions changed as easily as fashions, shared one common thought, it was this: the unquestionable beauty of Eugénie Danglars was akin to that of a marble statue. A score of disappointed suitors and scorned lovers had deemed her too hard, too unyielding, cold to the touch.

Louise d'Armilly glanced at her companion who stood beside her unmoving on the small balcony and looked at the trickle of audience that slowly filled the great Teatro Argentina. She could easily see the signs of excitement and agitation in what to the unaccustomed eye appeared a calm, even stern countenance.

Louise saw the crease on her friend's forehead right above her nose that spelled more intense concentration than displeasure. She saw the hand gripping the gilded rail with enough tension to render the bones on the back of the hand clearly visible. Louise wanted to kiss each one of those delicate bones, and she would, had she not been aware of the audience. Instead, she laid her small hand over Eugénie's and smiled when she turned to look at her.

"You know me too well," Eugénie said with a hint of a smile. "Now that the moment is upon me, I seem to have lost my conviction."

"Hush, I know you have not. Come now. Is this the same brave scoundrel who stole me away in the night to go after dreams I hadn't dared imagine?" The words were flippant, but they were said gently, Louise's fingers stroking the pale underside of Eugénie's wrist.

That earned her a tight smile. "Yes. But I am rather afraid I have run out of tricks."

That was more of an admission than any living person had ever heard from Eugénie. Louise knew Eugénie did not question their past decisions; what disconcerted her friend was a sudden doubt in her own abilities, likely a novel sensation for her. Eugénie was not the type to fret before a performance, had indeed nothing but scorn for overly dramatic actors and actresses, but this was their first performance together and the most important part Eugénie had yet to sing in Rome.

"It doesn't matter what you can or cannot do. In a few moments, you will be Orpheus and I your Eurydice, and I will trust you to brave the Furies and cross the river Styx for me."

Eugénie looked at her, dark, troubled eyes meeting cloudless blue.

"You have more courage than I," she said with the strange solemnity that was so characteristic of her.

Then, all too soon and not quickly enough, they were running down the winding stairs to the dressing rooms, to the noise and laughter and fevered hurry. Impersonal hands fastened lacings and did up buttons. Louise could only steal a quick kiss before Eugénie left to take her place on the stage.

When Louise heard Eugénie’s rich voice twist the first low notes of the aria into a raw lament, she knew her friend would succeed no matter what. Sat at the wing to wait for her turn much later in the performance, she saw Orpheus weeping at the grave of his beloved. She recognized her friend, knew the familiar resonance of the voice they had worked relentlessly to train, yet on the stage was the ancient hero who lamented his cruel fate. The tunic and cloak and lyre were a part of the illusion, as was the black hair that fell free to Eugénie’s shoulders as befitted a Greek poet, but the real secret was in the boldness of her gestures, the determined set of her jaw, the way she stood on the stage as if to say: this earth under my feet is mine and even the gods will not take it away.

Most important of all, she took the grief of another and wore it as her own in her voice and in her body; a sign of a great artist. Louise swallowed against the lump in her throat, against her own emotion and the imagined grief for which she was the sole reason.

It was very easy to slip the veil of Eurydice over her head.

 

 _Two: The Maiden and the Mute_

“Eugénie, if you leave now, I will never speak to you again.”

Eugénie grinned at Louise from atop her great black horse. The swashbuckler smirk, perfected in front of a mirror, only enhanced the hard angles of her features. Everything from the careless way she sat on the horse and held the reins in one leather-clad hand to the ease with which she carried the blue cavalry coat was performed with great artistry.

 “Don’t lie to me, love. It doesn’t become you.” Even the voice held a darker timbre, one that reminded Louise of the insides of ships, deserts under the watchful eyes of foreign stars. It did nothing to soothe the storm that had been gathering force since she had finally put together the pieces; the strange absences; the appearance of new clothing, pistols, swords, “for the purpose of practice”; the rekindled enthusiasm for fencing and horsemanship. Oh, she should have seen the signs, but their meaning had been too outlandish for her to consider seriously.

Eugénie, despite her smile, was utterly serious.

“Why in the name of God do you want to join the army? You are an artist, a musician. I doubt you even care for France.”

“What a thing to say,” Eugénie replied mildly, but Louise could tell she was wearing on her patience. Good. Let them fight because that was what dear Eugénie wanted. Let the whole street hear. “Besides, with my voice gone, I can hardly call myself a musician.”

That was the key to Eugénie these days: the absence of something vital that after the first grief had her always restless and impatient. The first winter in Italy had brought illness that developed from a painful cough to an infection that rendered Eugénie unable to speak. Louise recalled those dark days all too well – first the fear of losing her friend, then a loss of a different kind. The doctors said it was a miracle Eugénie regained her voice at all, even in its altered state. When she was finally allowed to speak, her pure contralto had changed into a much lower, huskier tone that was prone to cracking from exertion or emotion.

Eugénie would not accept any consolations nor words of love, and in truth, with time Louise found them harder to say as their plans fell through one by one. She felt quite alone, left to support the both of them while Eugénie surrendered to her black moods. It was Louise who had at last suggested a trip to France because she missed her mother and sisters. Perhaps she had already felt a foreboding of loss that made her want to be closer to home.

Eugénie had agreed readily enough, and the change of scenery had seemed to recover some of her old spirit. Now Louise knew the real reason for her elation – the trip coincided perfectly with the plans Eugénie must have been concealing for some time.

“This is what it's all about, isn’t it? You want to throw your life away on some mad, heroic adventure because you think you don’t have anything left?” Louise could feel the unbecoming heat on her cheeks, but it only served to infuriate her further. “They could send you to Africa for all we know! Can you not see that this, now, is how we lose everything?”

She closed her eyes against the prickling of unwanted tears. It was very unfair that she should be given all this, hard and tumultuous as their life together had been, and then have it taken away…

She felt the touch of warm leather against her cheek.

“Look at me, my love”, Eugénie said, her voice diving a little on the last word. “Living like this, trapped in the ballrooms and music halls and studios, forced to become an object of pity, a tragic figure fallen from grace – it is like death to me. And I am not intent on dying. I don’t want to spend my life watching from the wings when others sing, not even you. I want a career of my own.”

“And we are soon dirt-poor”, Louise added, lifting her eyes reluctantly because while she finally had the truth out of Eugénie, it was not what she wanted to hear. But then, she supposed that what she wanted had very little effect on the progression of their lives.

“That as well”, Eugénie admitted without shame. “The four years are up; our capital is almost gone. I must admit my estimations were wildly optimistic. If we return to Rome, we cannot live the way we are used to. I for one have no desire to linger on like a ghost at the edges of society.”

Louise sighed. She was not about to become a soldier, but she knew when a battle was lost.

“Everything is always about new starts with you.”

“Is that not why you love me?”

“It's why I hate you, sometimes. You can never settle down, never be happy with what you have.”

“Be fair – I don’t have all that much to keep me here. No, don’t give me that look. I want a chance at a life of my own making. You have told me yourself a thousand times that I have other talents besides music. I don’t have any passion left for the arts, but I am skilled with the sword, and I ride better than most men. The solution is perfectly simple.”

Louise wanted to point out all the complications, most of all the danger of discovery that would inevitably lead to ridicule and even punishment. When she looked at Eugénie in her blue coat and riding boots, her chest carefully bound and her short hair combed back to reveal every unforgiving line of her face, her bearing every bit that of a military man, she found that she had nothing to say.

“If I was a man would you condemn me?”

“Damn you,” Louise whispered, because of the truth of the question, and also because this was not the first time it had been turned against her in a quarrel. “And damn me if I let you go.”

She gathered her skirts and climbed on the low bench by the wall.

“Louise, what are you doing?” Eugénie asked as Louise took a hold of her arm.

“It’s not gentlemanly to keep a lady waiting.” She swung herself on the horse behind Eugénie with more willpower than grace. It was only her companion’s arm that kept her from toppling down, but she held on and dug her thighs into the horse’s warm flanks.

“You're being foolish. What of your dreams, your plans? You can't abandon Italy. You could still have your break.”

“You didn’t stop to consider my dreams before,” Louise told her. The bite of her words was somewhat softened for they were spoken against the back of Eugénie’s coat. “Regardless, I will go where you go.”

The grip of her thin arms around Eugénie’s waist was tight enough to be punishing, but Eugénie only covered Louise’s small hands with her gloved one and urged the horse into a trot.

“Thank you.” The whisper was as hoarse as the crackling of leaves, but like autumn, a promise of change.

“Lead on then, Eugène. To that battle you desire.”

Their life together had been one long war against family, against society, waged for and against each other.

What was one more battle?

 _  
_

_Three: Thieves and Heroes_

Louise’s laughter was like the pealing of bells as she clung to Eugénie’s arm, breathless and intoxicated by the noise and the crowd that fluctuated around them like a sea of colourful silk and paper. There were crooks and jesters of every manner, exotic beauties and horned devils, all unified in their fevered joy and the anonymity and freedom brought by the masks. Louise’s feet hardly touched the ground as she let herself be swept by the crowd, Eugénie’s strong arm reassuring around her waist. She had seen the carnival of Rome only from the safe confines of a carriage, but it was another thing entirely to be a part of it.

Fireworks lit up the sky; the crowd dispersed as if by common agreement; Eugénie pulled Louise quickly to the side of a house to avoid the galloping horses of the carabiniers who cleared the street; and then a thunder of hooves as the handsome Barbary horses raced past them, as frenzied as the crowd that flowed back into the street in their passing.

“I would very much like a horse like that”, Eugénie said into Louise’s ear, tickling her curls; she was forced to raise her voice. Louise was not surprised in the least that among all the marvels of the last day of the carnival, the horses were what received the most praise from her companion.

“After tonight, you can have ten horses if you want to”, Louise said and tossed her head in a teasing manner befitting her costume of a coquettish peasant girl, although she was beginning to feel the first touches of nervousness.

“Whatever would I do with ten? One would be quite sufficient.” Eugénie was bewitching in her flowing green silk and the gold-embroidered mask which covered most of her face, more a dryad than an amazon tonight. It was only on a night of deceit and treachery like this that she took delight in carrying a woman's dress.

“As you wish, love,” Louise sighed, and then started as Eugénie lifted her chin to kiss her right in the middle of the street. No one paid attention to them save for a few jealous glances. It was the last night of masks, another reality altogether where the rules of everyday life did not apply. Men dressed as women and women as men, nobles kissed peasants on the streets, and it did not matter who they were under their masks.

The beak of Eugénie’s mask pressed an indentation on Louise’s cheek, and her carefully-arranged curls threatened to come loose as Eugénie buried her fingers in Louise’s hair to cup the back of her head, but still Louise thought of the kiss as best this far.

When the candles were lit it was like a thousand stars had fallen from the sky to shine a light on the sweaty, dishevelled, smiling throng on the streets. As the playful fighting for the moccoletti started, the purpose being to steal or put out as many candles as possible, Eugénie pressed Louise’s hand briefly, and they stole away from the crowd.

The night felt suddenly cold without the heat of a hundred bodies around her. Louise pressed herself against the wall of an archway, not far from where Eugénie waited at the appointed meeting place. She almost hoped no one would come and they could leave this twilight world of dancing lights and grinning thieves behind them and go home; but as the clock struck eight, she saw a cloaked figure approach the shadows under the arch.

The man appeared quite agitated as he spotted Eugénie.

“Oh, I didn’t dare to believe you would come!” He tried to clasp Eugénie’s hand, but she avoided him neatly and raised the candle she had kept hidden by her palm to illuminate the man’s face.

“It is your excellency”, she said with the satisfaction of a hunter who has finally snared his prey. The young man mistook her tone as encouragement and put his hands on Eugénie’s waist. The gesture was not entirely inappropriate after the chase Eugénie had led him throughout the week, but Louise felt at once her dread tempered by a flash of jealousy. Who did the man think he was to lay his hands on Eugénie’s person, this upstart millionaire who seemed intent on wasting his inheritance in as frivolous ways as possible?

Louise half-expected Eugénie to strike him for it would not have been the first time Eugénie had repelled unwanted suitors in a violent fashion, but of course Eugénie was a better actor than that. She let the man touch her face and leaned close to whisper in his ear.

“Wait for the carriage, dear. It's waiting at the end of the street.”

“I only want a glimpse of your face. Surely that is not too much to ask from the one that has me enamoured.”

Belying his words, it seemed that this lover wanted a great deal more besides. Apparently confident that the aphrodisiac of his kiss would melt even the most unforgiving marble, he tried to force a kiss on Eugénie's lips. When the object of his love did not protest immediately, his hands wandered to the back of her dress to try to undo the sash around her waist. Eugénie made a move as if to stop him, but her wrist was caught in a surprisingly firm grip.

“I have been waiting for a long time, my dove,” the man whispered breathlessly. Eugénie grimaced in distaste. She reached around with her free had, then frowned as she did not find what she was looking for. Quick as a snake, she moved to draw a knife from one of the boots she was wearing under her dress, but someone was quicker.

“Let go of her at once, scum.” The high voice, usually lifted in song and laughter, was as chilling as the muzzle of the pistol pressed against the man’s neck.

Her blue eyes blazing and her hand steady on the ivory handle, Louise felt quite ready to shoot the man with the pistol she had seized from its hiding-place inside Eugénie’s sash.

“Don’t shoot him here, love,” Eugénie said as she stepped away from the man, brushing down her clothes as if to rid them of the unwelcome touch. “We don’t want to make a scene.”

To Louise’s disappointment, the man proved very amiable once he was convinced that his life was in peril. His excellency stepped inside the waiting carriage like he was entering a den of man-eating lions.

 “I must thank you for defending my honour,” Eugénie said later when their prey had been safely delivered. She was reclining on a divan in her smoking jacket and not much else, having disposed of her carnival dress as soon as the door to their rooms closed behind her. “Why, with that fire in your eyes and your hair spread in a halo around your head, I swear you were the perfect avenging angel!”

“Pray do not mock me,” Louise said, blushing and clutching her wine glass with fingers that only now did not seem to stop trembling.

“Look at me and tell me if I'm not completely honest.”

Louise could not question the feeling in Eugénie’s black eyes, nor deny her the kiss as her lips sought her own, nor the ones that followed.

“We did well to combine our fortunes with Luigi Vampa’s,” Louise said after a while, resting her head against Eugénie’s chest.

“I must agree with you. Although at first I thought our luck had deserted us when we had that run-in with his men, I have quite enjoyed playing the bandit.”

“And with this ransom, divided between Vampa and ourselves, we have capital enough to never have to worry about finances again?”

“We are free to dedicate ourselves to art and music and all things beautiful, to serve the Muses in any way we wish.”

“I do believe you have a poet in you,” Louise sighed happily, safe and satisfied in the arms of her dear, dear friend.

 _  
_

_Four: Like a Sweet Apple_

On a small bridge overlooking the mint-green waters of a canal that was only a small part of the labyrinthine waterways of Venice a couple stood and watched the passing of the gondolas. One of them was dressed in sombre black, the other in a light-coloured dress of French cut, and their features reminded the onlooker similarly of night and day. Only the mirth on their faces was the same.

“Look, another couple of newlyweds!” Louise exclaimed. “Does everyone come here on their tour after the wedding? What has happened to visiting relatives?”

“It's not in fashion anymore,” Eugénie replied. “Besides, one would have to be soulless to choose old, sour relatives over all the palaces and wonders of Venice.”

“I knew you would say that. Don’t they look happy to you? And this morning, the wedding procession we saw at San Marco was perfectly wonderful…”

“I thought the flowers were rather excessive,” Eugénie said. “I would prefer something more refined, something simple so as not to outshine the beauty of the bride…” She glanced at Louise when she did not get a reply and noticed the dreamy look on her companion’s face. “Louise, would you like a wedding?”

“Not in the least,” Louise said, woken from her imaginings. “I don’t want to be with anyone but you.”

”You misunderstand me,” Eugénie said. ”What would our wedding be like?”

“What a strange idea,” Louise murmured, “yet I must confess I have thought on it…”

“I knew it! Pray tell me what you have dreamt up. I did abduct you, after all; it is only honourable of me to marry you.”

“That was the easiest abduction in all of history,” Louise said with a smile. “Very well. It would have to be in the summer, of course, and we would have our celebration in the countryside, somewhere near Rome, perhaps, only us and some of our good friends. There would be strawberries and wine, little shepherdesses playing music, and dancing and poetry under the stars…”

“That's a very nice little pastoral,” Eugénie laughed. “Us frolicking through the meadows, a few fauns looking in on us perhaps, and Pan himself playing the lute! I have certainly seen that in an opera or two.”

“I knew you would laugh!”

“At the absurdity of my own imagination, not at you. I'm afraid we won’t have a wedding; or at least, it would have to be a very private affair.”

“I know that,” Louise sighed. “It's a silly dream.”

“However, if it's celebration and poetry you want, I can give you all that you desire.”

“Oh?” Louise asked, and then was silenced by the intense look on Eugénie’s face.

“’Like a sweet apple turning red high on the tip of the topmost branch.’” Louise felt her cheeks warm at the way Eugénie’s dark voice caressed the syllables, at the way Eugénie’s pearl-black eyes held her.

“’Forgotten by the pickers.’” A stray curl was brushed away by cool fingers that left in their wake a lingering heat.

“’Not forgotten – _they_ couldn’t reach it.’” Whispered into her ear, followed by a chaste kiss on her cheek, near her mouth, that left her heart beating like a startled bird in her chest.

“Eugénie, you are incorrigible,” Louise said as soon as she had recovered her wits and adjusted her gloves and done a number of little things to cover her embarrassed joy. Still, she found that she could not stop smiling.

“Come, let us find some music tonight,” said Eugénie and offered her arm to her companion. “I feel like enduring a dance or two.”

Louise did get a ring after all, a cheap silver trinket bought from a street-seller, and a matching one for Eugénie. It was decorated with enough curlicues and whimsical shapes to have Eugénie frowning, but she wore it anyway, long past the holiday.

Louise would look at the ring and think, that really does not suit Eugénie at all, and the thought would warm her heart. For she was the only reason Eugénie would wear it.

 

 _Addendum: Lovers  
(A page crumpled in haste and hid in a pocket, written in red ink over the margins.)_

In all possible futures, in every world waiting to happen, there are things that remain, fixed points that exist because they are _right_.

Louise would untie the ribbon to let loose Eugénie’s unfashionably long hair (ever the artist), or she would hide her hands in Orpheus' short tresses, or run her fingers through the close-cut hairs above the neckline of the uniform jacket – and there would be kisses, of the sort that curled one’s toes or made one wish to bite back in fury, but kisses all the same.

For regardless of the outer trappings of their lives, there is a bond between them that is wholly incomparable to any transaction made on the marriage market. Eugénie would call it mutual respect and partnership, Louise a communion of souls. And they would both mean the same thing.

Louise looks at Eugénie as her friend – her lover – shrugs off her jacket and starts on the buttons of her shirt. There is a wild sort joy in being allowed to watch and to act, to map out all places that draw shuddering sighs out of the perfect marble statue. The comparison is untrue in any case for Louise knows Eugénie is not flawless, but neither is she cold –

– far from cold as she kisses her way up Louise’s thigh, the skirts bunched up in a messy tangle about her waist like a jungle of fabric and lace. Sometimes Louise hates her pale complexion because it always betrays her embarrassment or anger, but at times like these when she can hear the blood thundering in her ears and Eugénie is looking at her like that, like she is some heathen miracle in an eastern desert and her lover a lonely wanderer too long tormented by the empty nights – at times like these it is hard to care about appearances.

Louise bites at the velvet ribbon between her teeth, or the cravat stolen from around Eugénie’s neck, because the need for secrecy is still there, always there. Eugénie kisses her with the same curious combination of intense concentration and abandon that is only reserved for her music, and that, more than any words, tells Louise that she is loved with all the passion of this artistic soul. Louise gasps, sighs, throws her head back on the pillow as the warmth in her belly and the warmth in her heart threaten to overwhelm her.

Eugénie’s strong fingers on her thighs keep her together as she is taken apart.

 

 _Postscript_

“You call me a poet, but I think you should reserve the compliment for yourself.”

Eugénie was sitting on the trunk which contained the meagre portion of her earthly belongings she thought necessary for the start of their life on the run. She held a small red notebook in her hand.

“I didn't mean for anyone to read that.” Louise could only barely resist the desire to cover her face with her hands. “All those terribly unflattering things I wrote…”

“Were nothing I would not wish to know. And in any case, I only have my own curiosity to blame.”

“Are you not even the least bit mad at me?” Louise dared to look at her friend who did not seem at all bothered by the mortifying revelations.

“Whatever for? I only hope we can live up to your dashing heroes! But I do have some slight criticism.”

“What is it?” Louise asked with renewed apprehension.

“I must admit I am not very fond of Glück’s Orpheus. He has ruined a perfectly tragic ending.”

Louise laughed, finally convinced that nothing had been lost.

“I much prefer happy endings.”

“I know you do, my darling. I know you do. I have just read whole four of them.”

“You would consider all of them happy?”

“Are we not together at the end? Yes, I think them happy.”

No longer able to contain herself, Louise threw herself into Eugénie’s arms, quite speechless. She heard Eugénie murmur softly against her hair:

“I thank you for your dreams. And I swear I will not let your fears come true.”

**Author's Note:**

> Merry Christmas, Grey_Bard! I hope the fic has amused you. I certainly had a blast writing it!
> 
> The opera our heroes perform in #1 is [Orfeo ed Euridice](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JizoxuuTbuE&feature=related) (Orpheus and Eurydice) by Glück. In the 19th century, Orpheus was usually played by a female contralto. I believe Eugénie would have opinions about Amor saving the day in the end...
> 
> The poem quoted in #3 is an [unnamed poem](http://www.uh.edu/~cldue/texts/sappho.html) by Sappho, translated by Julia Dubnoff (poem 23).
> 
> Many thanks to hradzka for beta!


End file.
